San Diego County Juvenile Detention Abuse Lawsuit

Help Law Group advocates for survivors of abuse in San Diego County juvenile detention facilities, probation camps, and youth residential programs.

Hundreds of survivors have filed civil lawsuits against the county since 2022. Their accounts describe sexual assault, rape, coercion, and physical violence by probation officers and staff at facilities across the county. Alleged abuse spans from 1970 through 2022.

In May 2025, California Attorney General Rob Bonta launched a civil rights investigation into conditions at San Diego County juvenile halls. New civil filings continue to be submitted.

Survivors' accounts across multiple facilities and multiple decades describe the same conditions: staff with total authority, no safe way to report, and consequences for anyone who tried.

Sexual abuse allegations across San Diego County facilities include:

• Rape and sexual assault by probation officers during strip searches, late-night room checks, and shower time

• Staff at Rancho del Campo using pepper spray on youth as a pretext to move them into showers where abuse occurred

• A female probation officer at Camp Barrett who allegedly sexually assaulted a 16-year-old on four separate occasions during one stay

• A male probation officer at the same facility who allegedly forced oral sex and threatened to delay the youth's release date if he refused

• Children as young as two years old sexually assaulted by staff at the Polinsky Children's Center

• Children told at Polinsky that they would never be allowed to leave if they disclosed what was happening to them

Physical abuse and coercion allegations include threats of death, physical violence, and prolonged isolation used to silence youth who considered reporting. Survivors in lawsuits filed in February 2025 described abuse as daily, occurring in the most enclosed and private settings of detained life.

What connects these accounts is not only what staff did. It is what the county chose not to do each time a child tried to say something.

Kearny Mesa Juvenile Detention Facility

San Diego County's primary long-term juvenile hall for decades, housing up to 359 youth under the Probation Department. Replaced in October 2024 by the Kearny Mesa Youth Transition Campus on the same site. Named in numerous civil complaints and covered by the AG's 2025 civil rights investigation.

East Mesa Juvenile Detention Facility

A short-term intake facility located at 446 Alta Road, still operating today. Survivors describe sexual abuse occurring frequently, with reports being ignored and staff continuing without consequence. Also covered by the AG's 2025 investigation.

Camp Barrett

A county detention camp in Alpine, California, approximately 30 miles east of downtown San Diego. Its remote location and minimal supervision are cited in multiple civil complaints. Closed in 2018 but named in active lawsuits, including a November 2024 filing describing assault by two separate officers during the same year of detention.

Rancho del Campo

A juvenile ranch facility where civil complaints specifically allege that staff used pepper spray on youth as a pretext to force them into showers where sexual abuse then occurred.

Juvenile Ranch Facility, Campo

Located in a remote border community near the Mexican border. Closed before Camp Barrett due to declining juvenile arrest rates. Survivors who were held there describe staff exploiting the facility's isolation to abuse youth without oversight.

A.B. and Jessie Polinsky Children's Center

An emergency shelter for children removed from unsafe homes, operated by San Diego County's Health and Human Services Agency. More than 150 civil complaints have been filed since September 2024. Alleged abuse spans from the early 1990s through 2023. Children were allegedly isolated from other residents so staff could assault them, then threatened into silence.

Girls Rehabilitation Facility

A 50-bed county-run facility that has also been named in civil scrutiny and complaints.

Civil complaints and investigative reporting describe specific decisions that allowed abuse to continue long after the county had been put on notice.

• Staff accused of abuse were transferred rather than removed or investigated

• Youth who reported were threatened with physical harm, death, or longer sentences

• Complaints were dismissed without formal documentation or investigation

• The county hired probation officers without adequate background checks

• No supervision existed in the settings where most abuse occurred: late-night room checks, showers, isolated spaces

• The Youth Law Center previously flagged San Diego County to the U.S. Department of Justice for PREA violations

A February 2025 San Diego Union-Tribune investigation found that supervisors routinely dismissed complaints, allowing abusive staff to continue working with youth for years. Children who tried to report left those conversations worse off than before they spoke.

San Diego County received these warnings. The abuse continued.

In May 2025, California Attorney General Rob Bonta announced a civil rights investigation into San Diego County juvenile detention facilities. The investigation examines:

• Whether the San Diego County Probation Department engaged in conduct that violated the constitutional or statutory rights of detained youth

• Conditions at East Mesa Juvenile Detention Facility

• Conditions at the Kearny Mesa Youth Transition Campus, which opened in October 2024

The investigation was announced in direct response to the wave of civil complaints and investigative reporting about abuse across the county's juvenile system. Findings had not been publicly released as of this writing.

The AG investigation runs separately from civil litigation but carries significant weight. Official findings that confirm the abuse or oversight failures described by survivors can become relevant evidence in civil proceedings.

The investigation also signals that the state is taking San Diego County's failures seriously at a governmental level, which adds to the legal pressure the county already faces from mounting civil claims.

Abuse Before January 1, 2024

AB 218, California's Child Victims Act, governs most San Diego County juvenile detention claims. Survivors can file until they turn 40, or within five years of the date they recognized that the abuse caused lasting harm, whichever is later.

That five-year period begins not when the abuse happened but when the survivor made the connection between what occurred and how it has affected their life since.

Many San Diego County survivors were threatened into silence as children, spent years not recognizing what they experienced as abuse, or only recently learned that others were harmed by the same staff. Each of those circumstances is relevant to when the five-year discovery window begins.

Abuse On or After January 1, 2024

AB 452, signed in 2024, eliminated the civil statute of limitations for sexual abuse occurring on or after that date. Youth harmed in San Diego County facilities after January 1, 2024, face no filing deadline.

Older Claims and County Settlements

Los Angeles County's 2025 settlement included time-barred claims alongside timely ones rather than contesting eligibility case by case. San Diego County faces comparable civil pressure. Survivors whose claims appear to fall outside current time windows should seek a review before assuming their situation is closed.

Who Can Be Held Liable?

Claims can name the San Diego County Probation Department, the county's Health and Human Services Agency, individual probation officers, and other entities that operated or oversaw youth facilities. Family members seeking information on behalf of a survivor are also welcome to reach out.

Many survivors who contact us have spent years asking the same questions: Is it too late? Does a closed facility matter? Will being detained as a minor be used against them in a civil case? We address those questions first, before anything else.

We review cases from people who were held at Kearny Mesa, East Mesa, Camp Barrett, Rancho del Campo, the Juvenile Ranch Facility, Polinsky, the Girls Rehabilitation Facility, and other San Diego County programs.

No documentation, prior report, or complete account is required. From there, we explain what options exist and what pursuing them would involve.

A review with us covers:

• A private conversation about where you were held and what you experienced

• An assessment of whether AB 218's discovery rule or any other provision applies to your timeline

• Identification of which county entities may face liability, including the Probation Department, Health and Human Services, or both

• An explanation of what county records may exist and how they could support a claim

• Answers to any questions you have about the process

You do not have to know whether you have a case before reaching out. That is what the review is for. Contacting us does not notify the county, the Probation Department, or any court.